


Born to Bosun

by beatriceHB, Meglifluous



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Blackouts, Drinking Songs, Excessive Drinking, First Meetings, Gen, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Past Abuse, Pre-Series, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-11
Updated: 2016-03-11
Packaged: 2018-05-24 15:39:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6158446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beatriceHB/pseuds/beatriceHB, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meglifluous/pseuds/Meglifluous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In 1708 a young man named William Manderly is rescued from impressment when pirate Captain Flint makes a prize of the HMS Colchester. Adjusting quickly and enthusiastically to a life of piracy, Billy finds it much more difficult to adjust to the presence of the mysterious and charismatic man at the helm of the Walrus. </p><p>Originally an RP between @bosunbillybones and @bornofsuchdarkthings on Tumblr, this story has been collected here as the first of what promises to be many explorations into the developing relationship between Billy and Flint.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Born to Bosun

**PART ONE: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

1708

The landsmen berth smelled of tar and mildew. Captain Flint didn’t want to spend any more time on the _HMS Colchester_ than absolutely necessary, but his conscience wouldn’t let him sink pressed men, no matter how much he hated the Royal Navy. Five such men sat on the wooden boards of the common crew quarters at gunpoint, hands behind their backs. They looked broken and malnourished and none of them made eye contact. Flint couldn’t look at them without thinking about what Thomas would say had he lived to see such a thing. Citizens snatched right off the streets and condemned to military service for the crown, now the captives of pirates. It was an affront to everything civilization was supposed to stand for. Teeth grit, the Captain pushed Levi’s gun down and turned to the quartermaster at his side.

“These men are no threat to us, they’ve been held here against their will. We’ll have to take them along. If they want to join up, fine. Otherwise, we’ll drop them off when we get home. They’ll be a hell of a lot happier in Nassau than they’ve been here.”

Gates frowned thoughtfully, also eyeing the five captives, two of whom, despite the obvious starvation, looked strong.

“Pressed men have been known to turn, Captain. Might consider a blood oath, just to be sure of them.”

Flint had already turned to go and hesitated in the doorway with his back to the men. “Bring them to the wardroom and let them choose their own fate,” he said without turning back around.

He glanced over his shoulder to make sure Gates had understood. The stout quartermaster wasn’t looking at him, but one of the pressed men was--though to call him a man was perhaps unfair. He was a boy, really, likely no more than sixteen, and he had the widest, bluest eyes Flint had ever seen. They were filled with questions, and also a quiet determination to miss no opportunity, to survive. The Captain met the boy's bold gaze and felt suddenly compelled to speak. He turned back around.

“I know what you’ve been through, and I know that you’ve been told we’re the enemy. I want to tell you two more things. The first is that pirates are sailors, just like you. We adhere to principles of independence and democracy, and if you join with us, you will never again find yourself alone facing an empire that sees you as less than human. You will be surrounded by new brothers, and you will keep what you earn. The other thing I want to tell you is that you can, you should, trust your own experience. Is this a nation you want to serve? Is this how a sovereign protects her loyal subjects?” He gestured at the derisory conditions of the berth, meeting each of the five men’s gazes in turn and then coming to rest, again, on the ocean blue eyes of the boy at the end. Jesus, he was beautiful. “Your officers are being led to the wardroom right now. You have three choices. Leave here with Levi, who will take you back to our ship where you’ll travel as passengers and free men to Nassau to do what you will, follow Mr. Gates and me to the wardroom to stand and die with your officers, or follow Mr. Gates and me to the wardroom to watch the execution of your former officers before signing the articles of my ship and joining our crew. Any questions?”

 

**PART TWO: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

He was looking right in Billy’s eyes, this man they all called Captain, and offering him a choice. For the first time in his short life he was to have a say in the course it took, and that simple fact was astonishing to Billy. He’d been still a child when pressed, answerable to his father in all things. Since then, any number of bastards had called themselves his master, and filled his every waking moment with their demands and their needs. But this choice was to be his and his alone. In that instant Billy felt himself no longer a child, but a man grown.

He listened with half an ear as the others mumbled their questions: How many times a day would they eat? Was a pirate expected to pay for his own uniform? (that prompted a few snorts of derisory laughter). But these things didn’t concern Billy. His concern was with more fundamental questions. He knew that the choice he made today would mark his life for years to come; would indelibly alter what it meant to be William Manderly.

His mind created a vision of the fork in the road, as real to him as the bench he sat on and the rope that held his wrists. One path began in innocence, and took him to Nassau to live on his wits, and later perhaps to England again and reunion with his family. The other path began in brutality, and took him into every kind of danger, to live and fight for this man beside a new family of brothers.

He knew which was the righteous path, the path that William Manderly the young leveller of Kensington would have chosen. But as he held the Captain’s gaze (who still stared into his eyes even though he answered the other men) he knew that the full-grown Billy’s soul was no longer so spotless. He’d come of age in the squalor of _The Colchester_ , how could it be otherwise?

With every passing year, Billy’s memories of his parents and their cosy fireside had grown more indistinct, until they took on the character of a fairytale. By contrast, the Captain was almost painfully vivid and bristling with vitality, from the intensity of his eyes to the stripe of fresh blood down his cheek (almost certainly not his own). He carried himself with an authority that seemed effortless, irrefutable. And he held out the promise of vengeance, made it sound like a just and righteous thing. And he had given Billy a choice. The boy’s survival instinct – honed to a fine point in recent years – told him that here was an opportunity, one that a young and inexperienced man ought not to turn aside.

Suddenly spurred to action, Billy rose to his full height and spoke from his heart the only question that still mattered: “Sir, I’ve already made my choice, I’ll join your crew if you’ll have me. Now do I get to choose which of those bastards I kill?”

 

**PART THREE: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

A slow, dark smile spread across the Captain’s face as the strapping young man with the cerulean eyes rose to his full height to speak. His accent had traces of West London hidden behind more recent Leicester influences and his body pulsed with life. Flint imagined he could hear his very heartbeat and realized he’d been wrong when he’d written these men off—this one was passionate and thriving, his spirit wholly unbroken.

 _“Absolutely,_ ” Flint assured him, a dangerous gleam in his sea-green eyes. As the boy watched him with spellbinding intensity, Flint swallowed and turned his attention to Hal with raised eyebrows; he found his stalwart quartermaster sizing the young man up just as blatantly, and with just as much obvious approval, as he feared he had just displayed. The quartermaster probably wasn’t quite so stuck on the words _“if you’ll have me,”_ though, Flint thought to himself wryly while walking slowly around the boy. He stopped behind him to cut his wrists free, working more slowly than was strictly necessary, admiring the strength in his arms but careful not to touch his skin as he slipped his sword beneath the rope knot. At the last possible moment, the frayed rope dropping to the boards, Flint let his fingertips brush lightly across the rope burn on the young man’s wrist. Thomas’ soft, cultured voice sounded teasingly in his head. _My goodness, James, you are **lost** … _Flint felt himself flush and was grateful to be standing behind the boy.

In front of him, Gates was grinning and passing over his belt knife. “Now _that_ ,” he was telling him with a friendly wink as the young man reached out to accept the offered blade, “is the question of a proper pirate! What’s your name, son?"

Blue Eyes very politely gave his name as Billy and dutifully followed Flint and Gates, along with one of the other impressed men, out of the landsmen berth while Levi led the other three back to the _Walrus_. Flint stopped in the passageway just outside the wardroom to cover his face with a scarf and caught the young man looking at him again. As he held the Captain’s gaze, an anxious kind of curiosity knotting his eyebrows, Billy mirrored Flint’s earlier gesture, grazing his own fingers across the welts on his wrist. Flint blinked at him, startled, and then strode quickly through the door, scolding himself for his folly. As Gates and Billy and the other young man followed him in, Flint nodded to Joji, whom he’d left on guard duty, and raked his eyes across the officers of the _Colchester_ with undisguised contempt before nodding to Hal.

Gates stepped forward with a mischievous gleam in his dark brown eyes and addressed the officers with a trace of sardonic derision emphasizing the light northern accent of his speech.

“Well, now. This would normally be the moment I’d pick one of you Navy rats to get cracking back to London so as you might let the Admiralty know they’ve lost _another_ ship to Captain Flint. But I believe Billy here means to disqualify one of you from the honor.” The quartermaster patted the young man’s massive shoulder and gave him an encouraging smile. “They’re all yours, son.”

Flint’s eyes darted to Billy’s hand as it tightened around the handle of Hal’s belt knife. He thought of Thomas again and wanted, suddenly, to stop what was about to happen. The boy was on the brink of getting blood on his hands, literally. What if he was an innocent, pure of heart and deed? It wasn’t his fault he’d been pressed—he’d been taken from another life; who knew what it was, what it might yet be? Maybe there were loving parents somewhere worrying over him; perhaps there was a bright, productive future still waiting for him like an exquisite, glittering jewel held tight in the soft, warm hands of some hopeful young maiden. Flint took a step forward, gripped by a strange kind of panic— _that’s your conscience, James,_ Thomas whispered in his head—but Billy stepped toward the officers at the same time and Flint caught the look in his eyes. There was something wild there he recognized; something murderous.

Flint exhaled slowly and made himself still, preparing to bear silent witness to the young man’s becoming. He would save him later, when he saved them all. He would pry a future for the boy out of England’s cold, dead hands if it came to that, and it would be more precious and luminous than anything anyone could have conceived for him before. It would be the future Thomas dreamed up, a paradise on earth.

And the obvious course was to sail there on an ocean of blood…

 

**PART FOUR: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

_He must know what’s coming_ , Billy thought as he stared murderously at the Sailing Master. The man’s body was wracked with tremors and his face was bloodless, in stark contrast to the pink flush of excitement it usually developed in Billy’s company. _You mothercunting son of a shite._

Billy stood still for a moment, allowing his anger to build to a fever pitch, feeding on his erstwhile tormentor’s terror. A full year he’d lain beneath that man, gritting his teeth and waiting for it to be over. Listening to all his bullshit about ‘just a bit of comfort lad, I know you like it too.’ Eventually he’d learned a few tricks to speed the arsehole on his way; didn’t hate himself for it either, a man does what he has to. And he was doing exactly that, right now.

He extended his arm slowly, almost theatrically, until the fearsomely sharp point of his knife stopped mere inches from the Sailing Master’s throat. The man whimpered and shrank from it, but was prevented from retreating by Gates, who’d crept to his rear, and now held him fast with an iron grip. How feeble he looked next to the quartermaster’s solid frame, how pathetic. Gates craned his head around to catch Billy’s eye and gave him a conspiratorial wink, encouraging him on.

Tingling fingers shifting around the knife’s handle, Billy took a step forward and pressed the flat of it into the trembling creature’s neck, pricking him with every shuddering breath he took. This was where he’d strike, he’d known that from the beginning. But why hurry? He was inclined to take his time over it, the way he might over a fine meal (not that he’d had many of those).

The boy inside him could never have done this thing, would have turned his face from the horror of it. But Billy had a small cold space in his heart, a sliver of ice that this man had put there. Killing would always come easy to him when the circumstances demanded it.

“I could have knocked you out any time I liked,” he said, conversationally. “I wanted to do it every day, but I didn’t. D’you know why?”

The Sailing Master whimpered again, and shook his head as much as he dared with the blade so close.

“Because they’d have hung me for it, your friends here…” he flicked his eyes to the horrified faces of the other officers, all of whom had the sense to stay mute, “and I wanted to live, so that one day I could be your end, and watch you bleed out at my feet!”

The last word turned into a shout, and as it left his lips he turned the knife on its side and stabbed inward, his forearm burning with effort as he dragged the blade through every knot of resistance, ripping the Sailing Master’s throat open wide, spraying them both with blood. It struck the side of his face, making him gasp, and soaked his arm up to the elbow, turning the sleeve of his shirt a livid red. Eyes wide and panting, he watched the stain grow and spread with satisfaction; it felt appropriate.

Gates released his grip and they both stood by as the Sailing Master sank to his knees, hands clawing at his wound as though he had some chance of staunching it, before finally slumping lifeless to the floor. The quartermaster’s face held an expression of mild appreciation, as he regarded the body at his feet. He nodded to Billy, like one craftsman to another.

“Not bad, son. A bit flashy with all the talking and whatnot, but you got the job done nice and neat in the end.”

 

**PART FIVE: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

Flint allowed a slight smile under the turban that covered his face. He had never seen Hal so taken with a new recruit before, at least not since he himself had dropped a purse of gold in front of him and started spinning outlandish tales several years back. He also allowed himself to stop worrying over Blue Eyes’ soul—it was clear that something personal had transpired between him and the Sailing Master and that his vengeance was righteous. Flint didn’t bother to wonder what it might be; he’d been on enough ships to know that vendettas arose swiftly and often. Maybe he blamed the man for the death of a friend, maybe gambling debts were owed. What was certain was that Billy had wanted him dead, and now he was. Flint nodded to the boy, trying to convey approval, and then, at Hal’s nod of acknowledgment, slipped out into the passageway, anxious to get away from any naval men that might recognize him and knowing that he was leaving the newest members of the _Walrus_ crew in good hands.

As demanding as taking the 54-gun frigate had been, moving her guns and sinking her was almost worse. The former had been a matter of tactics, navigation, cunning, theater and luck—mechanisms Flint was growing more confident with by the day. The latter ended up involving a lot of patience, coordination and physical strength, and despite getting annoyed when Gates mentioned it for the fourteenth time, Flint had to admit that Billy seemed to possess these traits in spades. He was a natural leader of men, fair-minded and tolerant, but seeped in a tireless work-ethic he clearly assumed extended to everyone around him. Because Flint had initially suggested they make him a gunner—those arms seemed practically made for it—Gates had felt it necessary to provide him with a steady stream of reassuring updates after putting him with their boatswain, Randall, instead.

“Jesus, Hal, I don’t care! If he’s lettered, let him be the bosun’s mate.”

“He _is_ lettered. I asked him!”

“There you go, then.”

“And Randall seems to like him, did I mention that? Randall! Who doesn’t like anyone!”

“Unless you want me to marry them, why don’t you get the fuck out of my cabin and let me finish these charts…”

By the time they were cutting the _Colchester_ loose, the sun had long since set and as far as Flint could tell, Billy hadn’t even had time to wash the Sailing Master’s blood off his hands, much less sign the ship’s articles. Flint hadn’t fared much better, spending the better part of the afternoon trying to plot a course back to New Providence that would get them there as quickly and safely as possible, while also intercepting and making a prize of a goods-laden merchantman Eleanor Guthrie had called to his attention before they’d left.

The truth was, he was worried. They’d had no real business taking on a fourth-rate ship of the line in a 22-gun, converted East Indiaman—that they’d succeeded only made them bigger targets than they already were. He was glad of the victory, of course—fuck, he’d take another tomorrow if he thought he could get away with it—but the men were still too giddy with having bested a naval vessel to seriously contemplate the danger their captain had put them in, and Flint wanted to keep it that way by getting them back to Nassau post haste. They needed to refit, and even more than that, they needed to be nowhere near the vicinity when the _Colchester’s_ fleet came looking for her. But they couldn’t go home without the merchantman—Eleanor was counting on the income, and besides the guns, they hadn’t taken much of value off the naval ship.

He was elbow-deep in maps and charts when Hal’s boots stomped into his cabin for the fifteenth time that evening. Flint didn’t even bother to look up.

“Didn’t see you at mess, Captain,” Gates started.

“Can we make this quick, please?”

“We need to have Billy here sign the articles.”

Flint looked up, surprised. How the fuck could someone that tall be that quiet? But there stood Blue Eyes, one step behind the quartermaster and slightly hunched over so as not to so thoroughly dwarf him. His eyes were taking in the star charts and globes and lingering on the rows and rows of books in the cabin. He’d clearly had time to wash, eat and change, though where they’d found clothes to fit him, Flint couldn’t guess. He also couldn’t figure out what looked so different about him until he realized that the grubby white, high-collared naval-issue shirt he’d worn previously had been exchanged for dark green linen, brazenly open at the throat. Between that and the colour in his cheeks, he looked like a whole new man.

Flint swallowed and pushed the charts back. Between needing the articles read aloud to him and meticulously going through a list of ridiculous questions that had apparently been weighing on his mind for many years, the other man they’d taken up—Logan—had taken Flint two whole hours to process. He absolutely did not have time for this. But he found himself gesturing for Billy to take the seat across from him anyway, and before fully deciding to do so, had signaled Hal out of the room, passed the articles to Billy, and started to open up a very nice bottle of Sangiovese.

“So, Mr. Gates tells me you’re lettered?”

 

**PART SIX: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

Billy perched awkwardly on the cushioned leather seat, his young body unused to such comforts. He straightened his back and cleared his throat, keen to put his best foot forward.

“Yes sir, I read quickly and I’m told I have a good clear hand.”

The Captain nodded his approval, and Billy felt himself smiling, his chest swelling with pride. He knew how rare it was to find a lettered man on a ship, still less one who could produce tidy rows of copperplate handwriting on command. It made the numerous canings he’d received at the Haberdashers’ Aske’s school begin to seem worth it.

Since no more questions were forthcoming, Billy turned his attention to the paper in his hand. It was dog-eared and discoloured, god knew how many hands had held it, but the more he read, the higher his heart soared. It was as though all his vague intuitions about how one man should behave towards another had been pulled right out of his soul and transcribed onto these pages. Don’t steal from another member of the crew, don’t take more than your fair share, don’t strike another man without good cause; these were basic, simple principals that no man could argue with. Living by these rules would be as easy as breathing.

Deep down though, he suspected that he’d have willingly joined up whatever the articles had said. In just this one day, he’d seen enough to know that the pirate life was everything he wanted. It was already taking on the warm glow of a perfectly happy memory.

The first thing Gates had done was to show Billy his berth, which even though it was barely 14 inches wide, was luxurious in comparison to the _Colchester_ , where he’d been obliged to sleep propped up in a corner more often than not. Gates had then informed him (gleefully) that the Captain favoured two watches over three, which meant that he might actually manage to sleep in it for more than a couple of hours. From there they’d progressed to the main deck, where Gates had handed him over to the bosun, before clapping him on the back good-naturedly and taking his leave:

_‘This man’s name is Randall, you would be advised to do whatever the fuck he says.’_

They’d worked him hard, but he hadn’t minded. And as he’d worked beside them, Billy had taken the opportunity to watch and listen to his crewmates, to judge how they behaved. Most of what he’d seen had given him heart. There were disagreements and plenty of teasing, but it all seemed pretty harmless. So unlike the sour atmosphere on the _Colchester_ , where the men were cruelly divided into tiny gradations of rank and rate, and every man fought a constant battle to reinforce and improve his status; simultaneously shitting on the man below him and currying favour with the man above. Billy had never managed to acclimatize himself to that bitter and scheming way of life. And in any case, as a pressed man he’d always been the lowest of the low with no prospect of betterment.

Here though, he felt in his element. He even looked a proper pirate now, in the new clothes they’d found for him - they’d let him burn his old ones and he’d pissed on the ashes for good measure. The salt spray had never felt so good on his face, the ropes had never yielded so easily to his touch, and the horizon had never seemed so full of promise. After mess, he’d stood for a moment at the prow, savouring the salt-scour of the spray on his face and grinning like an idiot; his heart fairly bursting with the spirit of adventure.

And now, this boy who’d been beaten only yesterday for merely looking a gunner in the eye, found himself sitting in the Captain’s cabin, drinking his wine! And it was good wine this. It slipped down his throat like silk and set him tingling in every extremity. He emptied the glass more quickly than he’d intended, nerves making him gulp rather than sip, and the Captain refilled it the moment he set it down, regarding Billy with a mixture of amusement and indulgence.

Billy swallowed, because here was the other thing that would gild this day in his memory for ever. This man, whose presence dominated the whole ship, the subject of so many whispered conversations and wild speculations. He wasn’t a popular captain by any means, nobody but Gates spoke of him fondly. But he was respected, and feared, and… fucking difficult to stop looking at. At length, he wrenched his eyes away from those exquisitely chiselled features and settled for browsing the Captain’s bookshelves instead, taking another anxious gulp of his wine as he did so.

 

**PART SEVEN: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

Flint smiled into his wine, thinking back to the time Thomas had dragged him to a _Commedia dell'arte_ at The Queen's on Haymarket—Billy was pure _innamorati_ ; the beautiful, young lover archetype bursting with sighs and blushes. The boy had frowned as he began to read the articles—concentration, Flint immediately comprehended, not disapproval—and Flint had been able to study him for a full two minutes before he looked up again, holding the stained papers in both hands with a devotion one would not have found amiss on the face of an ecclesiastic clutching a catechism. Flint drained his own tankard and then emptied the remainder of the wine bottle into Billy’s cup, topping it off before opening a desk drawer to pull out another. Honestly, fuck the merchant ship. He’d figure it out when they got closer. He was Captain Flint and he’d just sunk a fourth rate ship of the line. The merchant captain would piss his pants and strike his colours and that would be the end of it. He shoved the charts off to one side, not wanting anything but the desk and the wine between him and his newest recruit.

“You don’t have to sign your real name,” he said gently, noting that the boy had not yet reached for his quill. “From this moment forward, you can be anyone you want to be. Though mind you, if you’re captured and hung, like as not the name on those papers will be the name you swing under. I, of course am here to answer any questions you may have. Piratical articles are fairly standardized, but I’ve tried to tease out the Platonic ideals already inherent in them. You know—the starting point for the inquiry concerning the best political order being the fact of social diversity and conflicting interest—that sort of thing.”

Having just uncorked a second bottle, Flint left it to breathe and spun around in his chair to pull a thick, red-tinted leather-bound volume off one of the shelves. He turned back to Billy with a half-smile and slid it across the desk toward him.

“If you haven’t read _The Republic_ , you should. There’s some good stuff in there.” He poured himself another glass of wine as he began to quote from memory. _“Doesn’t it follow that a ship’s captain won’t seek and order what is advantageous to himself, but what is advantageous to a sailor? No one in any position of rule, insofar as he is a ruler, seeks or orders what is advantageous to himself, but what is advantageous to his subjects; the ones of whom he is himself the craftsman. It is to his subjects and what is advantageous and proper to them that he looks, and everything he says and does, he says and does for them….”_

After making the mistake of glancing at the young man’s face, Flint had to grab his tankard and take a long draw in an attempt to hide the grin that was threatening to overtake his. Sometimes he was so full of shit he could barely stand it.

 

**PART EIGHT: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

Billy dug his fingernails into his palms, more than ever in need of confirmation that he wasn’t dreaming.

Plato had not featured heavily in his education; his father had inclined more towards bible stories with a plain moral message, which could typically be summed up as: God’s always watching you lad, even when I’m not. So this was the first time in his life that Billy had encountered political philosophy, and it was like a window opening in his mind, vistas were suddenly visible that he’d never dreamt of. He didn’t need to know exactly what the words meant – and he wasn’t sure that he did – to be certain that they were right and good and true. The Captain had spoken them with such authority, they could hardly have carried more gravitas coming from the lips of an Old Testament king. In fact, the longer Billy spent in the Captain’s company, the more he struggled to understand his crewmates’ lack of love for him. The man was astonishing, wasn’t he? How could they not see it? Had he missed something?

Feeling embarrassingly like a peasant girl in the grip of an ecstatic vision, Billy tried to consider Flint dispassionately; to look for flaws in his character, to see past those flamboyant clothes that fit him so well, to dampen that delicious thrill that rushed up his spine whenever the man flashed him a sideways smile. But it didn’t seem to be possible. For some reason, it was getting bloody difficult to think clearly. He took a fortifying swig of wine, to clear his head.

The Captain had reclined so far in his chair that he looked on the verge of putting his feet up on the desk. _Concentrate dammit, he’s speaking again_ …Flint was holding forth on the nature of leadership with pedagogical zeal, but however desperately Billy tried to follow the thread of it, the meaning kept slipping from his grasp. He drank a little more wine and it seemed to help. Maybe he didn’t need to listen, maybe it was enough just to look…

He let himself drift, lulled by the ship rocking beneath him and the room spinning gently around him, whilst deep inside his head, compelling visions of the future began to form. _Fighting at the Captain’s side, his trusted right arm, almost an extension of the man himself. A kind of telepathy between them, moving as one, no need for orders. And when the battle was over, a glance from those penetrating eyes, and a strong hand squeezing his shoulder in unspoken gratitude…_

After a while he noticed that Flint had fallen quiet and was looking at him expectantly; he’d dipped his quill in ink and was holding it out to him… why was he..? _Oh! The articles… sign my name… anyone I want to be…_ It took a few passes before Billy managed to take the quill from Flint, it never seemed to be quite where he expected it. But on the third attempt he took hold, and felt himself shiver a little as their hands touched lightly in the exchange.

With the Captain looking on, his eyes sharp with curiosity, Billy began to deliberate over what name to sign. Billy he would keep; he’d liked the crew calling him that, and he’d especially liked the way it sounded in the Captains’ voice. But Manderley? No… he’d torn that name from his heart the moment he’d torn open the Sailing Master’s throat. With his whole body glowing, and the room stretching and shrinking about him, he couldn’t escape the feeling that this was his damascene moment, a chance to remake himself in the image… _in the Captain’s image?… Well why the fuck not!_ The need to demonstrate his lifelong loyalty to this man was as necessary as it was utterly overwhelming.

Slowly and deliberately, in ever so slightly tremulous letters, he wrote: Billy Bones. _I’ll take my name from the bones on your own flag, and I’ll be as true to you as they are._ That done, he sat back and regarded his handiwork with satisfaction. It had a nice ring to it. Suitably piratical too!

Smiling, he pushed the page back to the Captain, and thrilled to see him smiling back, as though he might have understood. Even if he didn’t, it was enough that he approved. Billy slouched back into his chair and raised his cup to wet his lips, but somehow it was empty again.

 

**PART NINE: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

_Billy Bones_. Flint let his smile slowly widen into a grin. _Bone-deep loyalty. Cuts to the bone. Living bare bones. Feel it in your bones. Bone up. And make no bones about it, the boy’s a pirate to the bone. Bone Billy. Billy’s bone. Jesus, you’re a child! Concentrate! Billy’s bone dry over there…where’s that Madeira? A Bual, wasn’t it...?_

The Captain got up and rummaged through the map cabinet until he located another collection of bottles. Finding the one he wanted, he brought it and— _oh hell why not?_ —one other back to his desk with him and reclaimed his seat. The boy was quiet, but emotions played across his face like music, making him considerably more entertaining than the ship’s most garrulous raconteur. Flint uncorked the Bual, reached across his desk to refill Billy’s cup and then topped off his own as well.

“I understand Mr. Gates has set you up as our bosun’s mate. That’s a lot of responsibility, but I’m sure you’re up to it. Though it’s counter-intuitive, you may find it most difficult adjusting to the sudden abundance of leisure time.” He took another swig of wine—amazing what you could find floating around in the North Atlantic—and continued talking just to watch the way his words reflected off the young man’s beautifully transparent face. “Pirate ships, as a rule, employ far more men than your standard naval or merchant vessel. That’s partly because we rely on the extra heft when it comes time to do battle, but it’s also a result of the conditions that have led to this unprecedented explosion in piracy. Every man on this ship is a mariner, and it doesn’t take seventy of us to keep her afloat. Subsequently, you may find yourself with more time on your hands than you’re used to, and some of it rather dull. It’s no coincidence that it’s much like being at war—long periods of aimless tedium punctuated by life-threatening skirmishes—we _are_ at war, Billy, with all nations at all times. I find it helpful to keep that in mind.” He flashed another grin. “I also find it strangely apposite.”

The young man was staring into an empty cup again, so Flint gestured encouragingly toward the open bottle. “Please, help yourself.”

It crossed Flint’s mind that he was setting up false expectations. The men aboard the _Walrus_ who had spent time drinking with the Captain in his cabin could be counted on one hand. As exquisite as Billy was to look at—and dear god, he made Michelangelo’s _David_ look tentative—a certain distance needed to be maintained between Captain and crew. And yet it was the boy’s first day as a pirate—a remarkable occasion by anyone’s estimation, and who could begrudge him a bit of fraternization? And besides, would it be the worst thing in the world if they should fall to talking from time to time?

Flint felt the wine starting to go to his head and wondered how the boy was still upright. It was probably that arresting height. The Captain pulled at his beard and made a note to himself not to try to keep pace. Dropping his gaze, he caught a glance of the tidal chart he’d shoved aside and realized with a flinch of his brows that Billy would be going over the wall before two full days had passed. A sudden wave of anxiety threatened to dampen his good mood.

“Are you a fighter, Billy? Any experience with blades or munitions?”

It was an entirely appropriate question, but a sudden memory of handing Thomas his Naval sword belt forced a dry swallow through Flint’s throat and his upper lip twitched away from his teeth. _If he says no_ , he heard himself thinking—though whether the thought was directed toward Thomas or Billy or himself, he wasn’t sure— _it’s not too late to teach him…_

 

**PART TEN: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

Billy opened his mouth to speak, but then stopped; his face creasing apologetically as he deliberated over his answer. _Say yes. He’ll like you if you say yes!_ Playing for time, he took another long swig of wine, and then cradled the cup in his lap. When he finally replied, he addressed the cup rather than Flint, which made it easier to defy the adolescent in his head.

“I’ve no experience with blades… or munitions.”

God knows it was tempting to lie, if only to coax another approving smile from the Captain. But Billy’s unerring common sense told him that was the kind of lie that ended with a knife in your guts, on your first time over the rail. It pained him though, to see the Captain’s face sink, just perceptibly, at his admission. There were other skills he could truthfully boast of after all, and he hurried to do so…

“But I can fight with my hands sir. I’m a _good_ fighter... I’ve had to be.”

He leant forward as he spoke and gripped the edge of the desk with his free hand, as much for stability as for emphasis. His ability to roll with the swaying of the ship was faltering more noticeably, even from the safety of his chair.

The Captain answered him with a raised eyebrow, its meaning unclear. He remained silent, but followed Billy’s movements closely, his green eyes meandering thoughtfully over Billy’s brawny forearms, as though weighing up the truth of his statement against the available evidence. A sudden gush of fear that Flint might not believe him encouraged Billy to elaborate…

“I’ve been in a lot of fights,” he continued urgently. “I don’t go looking for them, don’t get me wrong. They just sort of… find me. It’s to do with being taller I think. Bigger… you know.” As he spoke, he blushed and hung his head, as though his advantages were somehow embarrassing; his physical presence so demanding of attention as to be almost rude. “It seems to provoke the others,” he explained, his face clouding a little, “makes them want to test their mettle.”

The thought drew his gaze inward, where his mind projected a few choice memories as if to illustrate his point. Sneering faces swam before his eyes, the most vivid being a particularly odious little tosser called Denby that he’d been teamed with on the _Colchester_ ; he’d had hair like the bristles of a broom. After weeks of appalling provocation, the boy had eventually drilled down into the thin seam of rage that lay deep within Billy’s bedrock. _‘Come on big man,’_ he’d taunted, when Billy had squared up to him, _‘think yer something special do yer?’_ One blow was all it had taken to put out his lights.

As his brain replayed the incident in minute detail, Billy found himself caressing the back of his neck; a self-comforting gesture from childhood that he was yet to outgrow. The Captain’s talk of war was beginning to sink in, along with all of its implications. Violence would be his way of life now, not just the unfortunate by-product of being a powerfully built man. _I’d do well to develop a taste for it._

That thought led, inevitably, back to the Captain. Did _he_ have a taste for violence? He must do; why else would he be sitting where he was? But it was hard to imagine him fighting just now. There was something almost gentle about his movements; the way he smoothed his beard down with his fingers, as though the gesture might, any moment, transform into something more sensual.

Billy took another swig of wine, and followed it with a deep breath, slightly impeded by the obstruction that had formed in his throat. He might never enjoy fighting for its own sake, but maybe he didn’t need to. If this was a war, then he was a kind of soldier. And soldiers followed orders didn’t they? Something told him he would enjoy taking orders from Flint, however unpleasant they might be.

 

**PART 11: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

The topic of fighting yielded surprising results. The boy opened up suddenly, spilling what was for him nearly a torrent of information…or perhaps that was the wine? Flint had certainly had too much; he could tell by the way his head kept lolling to one side and by his utterly juvenile distraction over the word “bigger.” _Test their mettle…? Half of them just wanted to lay hands on you, Billy, and the other half, well – there are always those who seek to destroy everything rare and beautiful that happens into their path._

It didn’t surprise him to learn that the boy was good with his fists, but that wouldn’t cut it when they raised the red. The Captain rose from his chair suddenly and planted both palms firmly on the desk to counter the contending sway between the alcohol in his bloodstream and the pitch of the ship.

“We’ll be taking a prize soon, and I expect an orderly surrender, which will eliminate the need for a skirmish. But when we do go over the rail it’s to face men fighting for their lives, and the best right hook in the world won’t stop led shot from a flintlock.” His eyes drifted to the young man’s arms again and he smiled to hide a swallow. “You need a two-hander. We’ll keep an eye out for a Claymore or a Great Sword, but in the meantime—try your hand at that.” Flint chin-nodded toward a boarding axe near the door, a roguish gleam in his eyes.

The boy jumped up gamely but then had to struggle to stay upright, one hand darting out to clutch the back of the chair as he steadied himself. Once he’d found his sea legs, he strode toward the axe and lifted it with ease. Flint came out from behind his desk and gestured for Billy to join him by a thick wood pillar on the starboard side of the cabin. The boy obeyed, carrying the axe in one hand like it was toy.

“Alright,” Flint said when he was close enough. “Hit it.” He indicated the pillar with another nod.

The boy looked like he wasn’t sure it was truly acceptable to take aim at an object in the Captain’s cabin, but after an encouraging nod from Flint, he heaved the axe into the wood. It made a satisfying _thunk_ as the blade bit into the lumber. Flint grinned as he stroked his beard and indicated the axe again.

“Very good. Now retrieve it.”

Naturally the boy struggled, and succeeded finally on the basis of strength alone. Flint watched him muscling the axe out of the pillar with ardent attention, chiding himself in his head as he did so but too languid with wine and the illicit thrill of surreptitious gawping to stop himself. Even so, there was no excuse for walking behind the boy and reaching around to adjust his grip on the axe, but he did it anyway, hating himself as much as he loved the feel of pressing close against the young man’s back and reaching around those muscular arms.

“Move this hand back…good…Now, the trick is to swing downward and through, in one long sweeping motion…”

They swung together, chipping an impressive piece of timber off the column. Flint smiled until the wood hit the boards, then disentangled himself from Billy with clenched teeth, the excitement in his stomach cooling into first embarrassment and then a strangled kind of dread. He got back to his desk as quickly as he could, took his seat again and poured the rest of the Madeira into his cup before draining it in one long swallow. His eyes fell to the discarded sea charts at the edge of his desk and his mouth pulled into a frown.

_Hope you’re enjoying yourself, because your little game here could end up getting the boy killed tomorrow if we’re not ready to take on that merchant ship..._

Billy was still standing by the pillar with the boarding axe looking at him expectantly as Flint pulled the charts back to the center of his desk with a glower.

“Ask Joshua to help you practice with a flintlock and see Joji for further instruction in blades,” he directed without looking up. In front of him the blues of the tidal charts seemed to swim and bleed into one another until there was only the blue of the boy’s wide eyes…

 

**PART TWELVE: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

Everything in Flint’s demeanour heavily implied to Billy that he’d just been dismissed. But the Captain hadn’t said those words precisely, and Billy clutched at that small but significant fact to justify his lingering in the cabin.

No doubt it was foolish to defy the Captain’s will, if that’s what he was doing. But with the best part of two bottles of wine inside him, diluting his anxiety and bathing his world in a lovely reassuring glow, Billy was somewhat relaxed about the potential risk. He felt increasingly buoyant… almost invincible. Why not do exactly what he wanted for once? See where it took him. _Fuck it! What’s the worst that can happen?_

And what he wanted right now, more than anything, was to remain in this man’s presence. How could he leave? When he still felt the absence of Flint’s body so keenly, though it had held him for little more than a moment. The breath that had warmed his back through the thin fabric of his shirt had left a chill in its wake. And even as he hunched his shoulders and shivered against it, Billy knew that such actions were futile. Recapturing Flint’s attention was the only way to get warm.

It had probably meant nothing to the Captain… _all in a day’s work._ But Billy hadn’t been touched without malice for so many years. To suddenly feel himself safe and secure, in the embrace of a man he respected above all others. To be held, and guided, and kindly corrected; he had no words to describe what that meant to him. It was a reminder, as glorious as it was painful, of his true nature, long suppressed. He was a pack animal at heart, needing to belong, needing to _bond_. Whether he knew it or not, with that one gesture the Captain had created a physical craving that his newest recruit would seek to satisfy for as long as he lived.

 _Look at me, notice me again…_ Billy fixed his wide blue eyes on the Captain, willing him to look up. The man wasn’t reading; his eyes might have been trained on the pages before him but Billy could tell that they looked deep into some other world. With one tanned forearm he pinned his charts to the desk, as though they might otherwise escape. Every now and then he made notes, crossing out half of everything he set down with an irritable flex of the muscles in his jaw. Billy’s eye was drawn to his rings, thick silver bands that looked as though they were there to add teeth to his punch, rather than for any aesthetic or sentimental reason. He looked down at his own empty fingers, and imagined them similarly adorned.

His own right hand, he noticed, still held the axe; it hung limp and redundant without the Captain to give it purpose. He swung it a few times experimentally. Not connecting with anything, just enjoying the way it felt to wield something sharp and dangerous. Then tried, and failed, to tuck it into his belt, before reluctantly deciding to put it back where he’d found it. Bending over to lean it against the doorframe, he momentarily lost his balance and pitched forward onto his hands, dropping the axe with a loud clatter.

“Fuck!”

Flushing with embarrassment that would have been more acute had he been sober, Billy couldn’t help grinning as he struggled to get upright again. His hands gripped the pillar beside him for stability and, as he rose, his eyes drew level with the splintery gash he’d made in it. He and the Captain. The two of them together.

Staring at it with satisfaction, he thought of the messages he’d seen carved on trees; two names and a heart, or a girl’s name and something crude… He swallowed, and let himself notice the hot and heavy sensation in his groin, wine-fuelled and growing in intensity. He’d been working hard to ignore it, almost since he first set foot on this ship, but he couldn’t really remember why. Didn’t seem like such a bad thing? Felt bloody good anyway… and that thought turned his attention back to the Captain.

 _Look at me!_ Billy’s lingering presence was growing awkward now. He’d have to speak or give up hope and retreat to the galley. Striding forward, his feet taking a surprisingly irregular path, he leaned forward heavily and rested both hands on Flint’s desk.

“I’ll go and see them directly,” he said, “Joji and… that other one.” His voice came out louder than he’d intended. “I’ll do everything they tell me and I’ll practice all the time. But… if there _is_ a skirmish when we take that ship…”

He paused, his thoughts momentarily derailed by Flint’s sudden movement, the tilting upward of his head, the setting down of his quill. Billy swallowed.

“If there is… then I’d better learn quickly. And I reckon I’d learn a lot quicker from you.”

 

**PART THIRTEEN: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

Jesus. Seven hours on a pirate ship and the boy was already three sheets to the wind. _Of course, that **is** what tends to happens when you ply them with wine…_

If he were being honest with himself, Flint would have to acknowledge that he wasn’t far behind. On the surface, his emotions were playing a game of tug-of-war; exasperation on one side and amusement on the other. Amusement had the greater length of rope, but that was because of an undercurrent of something else, something he was trying not to acknowledge. And trying not to acknowledge it gave extra muscle to the pull of exasperation. There was nothing for it but to open another bottle. He sighed and gestured for the boy to sit back down before he hurt himself. Thank Christ he’d put down the axe.

“There won’t be a skirmish, Billy, not over the _Margaret_.” He paused his oration long enough to pull a fourth bottle out of his desk drawer and began opening it as he continued speaking. The cabin felt uncommonly warm and he wasn’t sure if it was due to the wine he’d already imbibed or to the unwavering attention of the boy’s hot gaze. “She’s going to strike her colours as soon as we raise the black, and I’ll tell you why.” There were several reasons for his confidence—the fear his banner was beginning to instill, of course, but also shipping insurance, which had nothing whatsoever to do with his skills or reputation, as well as the angle he’d bring the _Walrus_ in on, leaving the _Margaret_ no room or will to run, which relied on those things entirely—but the one he chose to share with the boy was calculated to keep those wide blue eyes locked into his own. “She’s going to strike because I’m going to _will_ it.” He smiled darkly as the pop of the cork being pulled from the bottle—or perhaps the theatricality of his accompanying sneer —caused the boy to startle. There were days, he had to admit, when he rather enjoyed being a pirate.

Leaning forward to refill the cup Billy had left at one edge of his desk and then topping off his own tankard, The Captain was careful not to let a single drop spill on the tidal charts.

“It’s all well and good to be strong here,” he continued, indicating his chest with the top of the open bottle while his gaze roved over the boy’s well-defined musculature. “But it’s not enough. You have to be strong _here_ , too.” He tapped the upper lip of the bottle against his temple before setting it back down on his desk between them. Maybe it would serve as a reminder there, a blockade – something to keep him from actually reaching across that slight distance. Though he hadn’t intended to do so, he found he had met the boy’s eyes again, and he searched them intently as he took a long swig, unsure of what he was looking for. He had already dismissed Billy’s forwardness as being the result of both the alcohol and the giddy relief at having escaped his previous tribulation. “You already know that, though,” he added more quietly, thinking back on what the boy had likely endured. “You’re obviously a very exceptional young man, to have escaped such adversity with your body, mind and spirit still so inspiringly intact.”

Though heartfelt and sincere, the words escaping his mouth caught Flint completely by surprise, setting off both a paralyzing memory of refined, affectionate laughter— _“Really, Lieutenant! Who knew you were such a flirt!?”_ —and a far more immediate pulse of mortification and shame.

 

**PART FOURTEEN: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

Billy circled a finger at his own temple, unconsciously mirroring the pirate Captain’s action with the bottle. _Was_ he so strong? At that precise moment he felt anything but; the last of his mental acuity first melting like warm butter at the unexpected compliment… _exceptional, inspiring…_ and then boiling clean away at Flint’s just noticeable faltering afterward. Am I being… courted? The thought was thrilling and compulsive, and like a rip current tugging at his feet he couldn’t resist the pull of it.

It couldn’t be that, it wasn’t... but still? He pushed the palm of his left hand hard into his stomach, trying to calm the quickening he felt there. It made him want a drink, that’s for sure; the wine already inside him somehow magnifying rather than quenching his thirst. But his cup already seemed to be half empty, though he’d no memory of lifting the glass, or of draining it. Time had jumped suddenly. No longer a smoothly flowing river, more like a white-water rapid full of unexpected peaks and troughs; as exhilarating as it was disorientating.

And then the cup was at his lips again, friendly warmth tumbling down his throat. And then it was on the desk again, and full. Had Flint refilled it? No… he’d done it himself. That’s right. He’d refilled the Captain’s too… and _oh shit!_ he’d spilled a little on the chart. Rising from his seat for a moment to reach across the desk, with his index finger he scooped up the bead of wine that quivered on the thick paper between them.

“I’m so sor..” he began, but before he could finish the apology his gaze collided with Flint’s yet again, and some quality in it silenced him. Instead he just let himself go on gazing as he lifted the blood-red drop of wine to his lips and let it break fruitily across his tongue. _He’s going to strike because I’m going to will it...fucking hell!_ It didn’t seem remotely far-fetched. _What do I think I’m doing?_

The Captain was the first to break eye-contact, and drained his tankard in one gulp. Though his wine was less friendly than Billy’s it seemed. His jaw was set tight, his mouth pulled downward, lips working ever so slightly. A vision of stroking his fingertips along Flint’s bristly jawline, of caressing that distractingly mobile lower lip, came to Billy with such sharpness, he worried for an instant that he might actually have done it. But if anything the possibility was becoming more remote, he could feel the Captain’s attention slipping away from him, drawn inward again, his rings clanking against the desktop as he shuffled the charts with renewed purpose. The intimacy they’d shared for a moment suddenly evaporating like so much steam.

He _had_ to recreate it, but how? His clouded mind grasped at straws; perhaps if he were to confide it might draw further confidences from Flint? And it seemed he was already talking… words coming to his mouth with such little effort it stunned him. The brutal internal editor that kept him silent more often than not had somehow been incapacitated.

“It wassa kind of rebellion, really,” he was saying, the words running together, intoxication smoothing away the sharp edges of each syllable. “Growing strong, keeping my head…” Flint was looking up at him again now and listening intently, his expression unreadable. “You know what my biggest fear was, the whole time?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “That something else might kill him. Some everyday shit. Fever from a bad tooth… washed overboard in a storm… mutton bone wedged in his gullet.” Laughter spilled suddenly from Billy’s mouth as he imagined the scene in his head, eyes directed sightlessly at the ceiling. That way would have been funny at least. Once he’d gathered himself, he continued. “Worst of all, I worried that some pirate might get there first. Steal my kill, mine! I never, ever, dreamed that the pirate would be me. But it’s perfect. _Fuckin’_ perfect.”

Trailing off, he flexed his right hand and recalled suddenly the effort it had taken to slice through all those cords of bloody resistance, the unwanted memory surfacing like a bloated corpse in murky water. It was followed, unpleasantly swiftly, by the crystal sharp image of his own father, done up in his Sunday best, dragging Billy by the wrist to their non-conformist church to make his confession. He blinked furiously and threw back the last swallow of wine that remained in his cup. No way he was going to let that man’s hatchet face take the sheen off his moment of triumph.

“It was right, the way that ended…” he mumbled, eyes cast down, not sure who he was speaking to now. “Father’s _no_ right to judge me, no right! Did _he_ save me from that lecherous fucker? Did his _God_ save me? No. _You_ did.” As he spoke the last two words he raised his head, and his cup, to Flint. As if in a toast. “It was a righteous thing, that’s what it was.”

The Captain’s eyes flashed wide, and Billy almost dreamt that he could see concern there, even compassion. It buoyed him. Cautiously, he slipped back into the pool of sour memories and let himself drift for a moment, this time with Flint’s physical presence and piercing gaze to anchor him. And perhaps they’d lost something of their power already, those horrors in his past? Perhaps the pain had been necessary, after all, to reach this point. Wasn’t it always a painful process, learning to swim? Couldn’t it sometimes deceive you into thinking you were drowning? But he wasn’t. He was pulling away now, with strong, confident strokes. And the water was warm, like silk against his skin, and the most inviting shade of green…

 

**PART FIFTEEN: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

The boy’s eyes had gone dark. Flint had seen the look before-- in his father’s eyes, in the eyes of naval men on shore leave…hell, there were probably a dozen pirates in the galley wearing it that very evening. It was the look men got when their alcohol-soaked brains had stopped functioning properly. It often portended violence, occasionally hilarity, and always a disorienting lack of memory the next day.

So the boy probably wouldn’t remember the way his Captain had stared at him and swallowed as he sucked a drop of wine off his finger. And there was no reason to think he’d have any kind of recollection of how beautiful he’d looked with his head thrown back in a rare peal of laughter. It was even possible that he wouldn’t recall sharing such intimate details of his suffering and strength. It would be up to Flint to remember, and that was fine, because Flint forgot nothing.

So he watched, and listened, remaining quiet, remaining still. And although he didn’t fully understand it then, in that silence he lived through the entire problem the boy presented for him in the space of two minutes.

In the first minute, Flint’s entire body was throbbing with desire; it was hardly possible to be someone for whom masculine beauty registered and not find Billy attractive. It was as if he had been designed, head to toe, expressly for the purpose of inspiring lust. There were moments when it seemed he knew this, when he would flirt with such audacity it made Flint want to laugh and pin him against his desk that very second. But more often, he seemed oblivious to his effect on people; there was a heavy weight on his broad shoulders, a soft frown immobilizing his lovely mouth. For Flint, that only deepened the appeal—he wanted to restrain that strong body and crack open the parts of his mind and heart that Billy kept so carefully hidden away. He felt relatively safe indulging in such fantasies, because they were clearly only that. More than once he longed with his entire being for Thomas to be suddenly sitting beside him, just so that he could share covert grins with him and hear him put the boy’s beauty into words both poetic and ribald.

In the second minute, Billy’s expression had hardened and he had begun to speak of past abuse with evident anguish. The sudden collision of lust and protective concern devastated Flint. He grit his teeth, upper lip raising into a snarl. One second he _was_ the lecherous fucker, the next he was imagining strangling the _Colchester_ ’s Sailing Master with his bare hands. It was horrifying and dizzying and although far from the first such tale he’d heard, it bolstered his already seething disenchantment with the Royal Navy, with England, with so-called civilization. That the confession came in the same torrent of words that elevated Flint above both Billy’s father and god sent the pirate Captain’s ego soaring— _yes, that’s right, I **did** save you, **I** did that, **me**_ —even as it brought him back to reality, reminding him of the boy’s young age, the copious amount of wine he’d imbibed, the fateful day he’d had.

When the boy seemed to have finally talked himself out, Flint rose slowly from behind his desk with the intention of gently directing him to his hammock and letting him sleep it off. But just as he took a step toward the newest member of his crew, he felt as much as heard a low, sonorous tone echoing up from beneath the hull. He froze, his expression lighting up with interest, and after a second heard it again—almost mournful, like a sustained cello note vibrating through the water, thrillingly forceful.

“Billy, listen!” He lowered himself to the boards suddenly, pressing an ear to the deck, straining to hear past the ever-present slapping of the waves and creaking of the ship. The next call came from closer than the first two, and from the floor of his cabin, he could feel it vibrating through his entire body. A smile broke across his face. “Whale song!”

 

**PART SIXTEEN: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

“What did you say?”

Billy emerged from the cool green waters of his daydream and discovered that the Captain wasn’t behind his desk where he’d left him. Instead, Flint’s voice was coming from beneath his desk, which seemed unlikely even to Billy’s addled brain, but a downward glance confirmed it. What the fuck was he doing down there?

But even as the young man’s mouth fell open in incomprehension, he heard the sound that had his Captain so enraptured. _Oh, whale song!_ He’d heard it once before, but not nearly this loud. His whole body resonated with the mournful tone, which seemed to start in his chest and finish at the back of his teeth. He could have sworn that the creaking of the ship grew louder too, as though its timbers were straining to pick up the strange harmonics.

But most striking of all was the affect it had on Flint, whose face was utterly transformed by a smile so guileless it made Billy catch his breath. The warmth of it drew him like a beacon, and moments later he too was on the floor; sprawled on his back beside the Captain, basking in his nearness.

Immediately he felt more comfortable; much safer down here than he’d felt up there in the chair. Viewed from this angle, the cabin didn’t seem to lurch about quite so much. He rolled over and pressed one ear to the boards, just like Flint; holding the older man’s gaze as they waited together for the song to resume. There were flecks of grey amidst the green in his eyes, Billy saw. And strands of silver in the hair at his temples. Most thrillingly, he detected a warm scent rising from the Captain’s skin; a faint trace of cologne. His tongue registered it more strongly than his nose; as though the man had seasoned rather than scented himself - and wasn’t that a distracting thought. But beneath the herbs and spices was something altogether more heady. Something like incense.

 _Oh fucking Christ…_ The impulse to crawl over there on his hands and knees, press his face against Flint’s throat and inhale down to his toes was almost too strong to fight. _You love to fight, you drink good wine like it’s water, you dress like I don’t know what …and apparently you also smell like a Papist._ A wicked smile crept across Billy’s face. _Father would fucking **hate** you…_

Until this moment, life had corrupted Billy without his consent. But now, he was minded to open the door wide and welcome the corruption in. He could feel it taking root in his heart, a secret little flower of lust blooming on fertile ground, dark and irresistible. The whales chose that moment to begin again, sending powerful vibrations up and down the length of Billy’s unnaturally long body.

“What do you reckon they’re singing about?” He slurred, with eyes full of wonder; then convulsed uncontrollably with laughter as the absurdity of the question hit him. Without waiting for an answer, he struggled manfully up to his knees and rapped against the floorboards theatrically. “Attention whales!” he giggled, “I’m afraid we don’t know that one. Try singing something we can all join in with! Here’s a ballad for you…”

Opening his arms wide, he sucked in a deep breath and began serenading his imaginary audience in an unsteady tenor:

“You… Gentlemen of England  
that lives at home at ease,  
Full little do you think upon  
the dangers of the seas!  
Give ear… unto… umm?”

He dredged his memory for the next line, eyes screwed shut with effort, but it wouldn’t come.

“How’s it go again?” he appealed to Flint, gazing down at him pleadingly. But the man had been overtaken by a fit of coughing and seemed in no state to help.

“Never mind... ’s crap anyway. Try this one instead…

Of late near the Strand we well understand  
Six lasses that took a brisk frolic in hand… in… urgh.”

Without warning, Billy’s stomach began to boil like a hot spring. He put a hand out to steady himself, then slumped down to the floor and pressed his face against the cold planks, unable, suddenly, to even think about moving. There was a sour taste at the back of his throat and his tongue was somehow too big for his mouth.

“I feel _sick_.”

 

**PART SEVENTEEN: FLINT (Meglifluous)**

“Alright, easy now, you’re okay…”

Flint sat up and grabbed a nearby bucket—after ropes they were perhaps the most prevalent item on board—and slid it toward the boy, feeling a strange surge of protective tenderness anchoring his amusement. Billy managed to get one arm around it, grasping it like a beloved dolly, but otherwise seemed disinclined to move. Eyeing his long, lean form stretched out across the boards, Flint doubted he could pick him up. Better perhaps to give him a moment, calm him until he could make it to the hammock of his own accord.

“They’re greeting one another…” he explained quietly about the whales, realizing that this may very well have been the first time he had ever sat down on the boards of a ship. Without his sea legs beneath him habitually balancing his gait, he could feel every rollicking lurch and sway of the waves. It was dizzying; a sudden anticipatory elation in his stomach just before the ship dropped, only to be met almost instantly by the rising counter-force; a warm steady surge pushing from his groin straight up his spine, settling finally somewhere in his teeth. He pressed his lips together and shook his head. It wasn’t the ship, it was the wine.

_It’s not the wine. It’s him._

“...Calling across a great distance. An introduction, perhaps, or a report of some kind. ‘Hello, it’s me. It’s cold here and I’m alone, but I can hear you.’”

He looked down at the boy again and wondered if he’d passed out. Billy was completely still, face pressed to the boards, eyes closed and mouth slightly open, but there was so much heat rising off of him that it was difficult to imagine he was truly insensible.

“‘I can hear you,’” Flint repeated, so quietly it was almost a whisper. “‘Come closer…’”

Watching breath fill and escape his lungs in a slow rhythmic ebb and flow, Flint caught the boy’s scent mixing with the fragrance of wet wood and burning tallow. He smelled like musk and sea water and sunshine, and Flint yearned to bury his face in the back of Billy’s neck and inhale deeply. A low, rumbling moan sounded from one of the whales and it seemed to Flint that the whole ship trembled sympathetically with the vibrations. He felt overwhelmed suddenly, on the verge of panic, his senses drenched and quaking. Without quite deciding to do so, he took a deep breath and began to sing.

“Of late near the Strand we well understand,  
Six Lasses that took a brisk Frollick in hand;  
Twas thus I profess, they in Seamans Dress,  
Not far from the May-pole resolved to Press  
Fourteen Taylors….”

He sang in a steady tenor, just to Billy, sitting on the floor beside him, forbidding himself to stroke the boy’s shorn hair, much as he longed to. In response to the first few notes, Billy had lifted his head long enough to gape, squinting at his captain in a kind of awed astonishment, but then quickly put his face down against the planks again. Flint continued.

“Young Nancy she tyd a Sword by her side,  
And she was resolved for to be their Guide:  
This young Female Crew, Kate, Bridget, and…Prue,  
And she that went foremost was Lieutenant—”

_“And you can sing, too, Lieutenant. Is there no end to you?”_

“—Sue…”

The voice came back to Flint so clearly that he too, for a moment, thought he might be sick. He stopped with a thick swallow, wishing he’d drunk a good deal less.

The boy mumbled something from the floor—Flint couldn’t make it out, but there was a plaintive tone to it that made him think it was “Don’t stop…” But he could not continue.

In the ensuing quiet he heard the whales again, the sound receding as they traveled the ocean depths, and then the Middle Watch bells. Two and a pause. Two again, and a pause. And then one. Two-thirty in the morning. It was far past time to be done with this.

“All right, up we go…”

With a grunt and a frown of determination, Flint scooped Billy up into a sitting position, pausing with one arm hooked around his back when the boy lurched forward toward his bucket as if to be sick, but then simply spat in it, looking dazed.

“We’re getting up now,” Flint instructed definitively. Another grunt accompanied them as they struggled up to their feet together, Billy having draped one enormous arm around Flint’s shoulders for support. He followed obediently, feet shuffling, as Flint guided him toward his hammock in the northeast corner of the cabin. Billy’s tall, lean frame burned hot against Flint’s side, compressed by drink and gravity as the floor made repeated lurching bids for his attention, but Flint held tight, one hand pressed against the boy’s muscular chest, the other flattened against his back, keeping him aloft.

_This is normal. Men do this all the time. Drunk men, crossing rooms together, holding one another up, arms and bodies tangled. It doesn’t matter how it feels. It shouldn’t feel like anything. It shouldn’t warrant a second thought…_

By the time Hal stuck his head in the door to check on the proceedings, Flint had almost convinced himself it was true. He looked up sedately from behind his desk, where he was working on the sea charts as best he could with the depth delineations blurring and bleeding into one another before his eyes. Billy was in the hammock in a darkened corner, out cold and dead to the world, a bucket below him and Flint’s wool blanket tucked around his strong shoulders. Hal couldn’t know he hadn’t gotten there under his own power. He couldn’t guess that Flint had sung him to sleep. There was no proof whatsoever that the boy had reached up and grabbed his captain’s face in both hot hands, staring at him in mute entreaty as Flint had slipped a pillow beneath his head, meeting and holding his burning gaze until at last those blue eyes had fluttered and closed, the boy’s fingers sliding down Flint’s stubbled cheeks like a caress before dropping back down onto his own broad chest.

_I can hear you. Come closer…_

“Jesus,” Hal chuckled, finally locating the new recruit’s prone form in the dark. “How much did you fuckers drink?”

“I only opened one bottle,” Flint shrugged, scribbling a notation in the margin of his chart, his breath short and his head pounding. “Four or five times.”

Hal snorted and then fell silent as the three am bells rang.

“Suppose I’d better lug this goliath back to his berth,” he sighed as soon as they stopped.

“If you can,” Flint said with a single nod, his eyes fixed firmly to the papers on his desk. “And silence the bells after midwatch. We don’t want the _Margaret_ to hear us coming.”

 

**PART EIGHTEEN: BILLY (beatrice3030)**

It was just getting light when Billy woke. He’d no memory of finding his berth or of climbing into his hammock. But even before he opened his eyes, he knew exactly where he was. The air around him was thick with the scent of men, row upon row of them packed tightly all around him. Snoring as their damp clothes dried on their unclean bodies. Groaning as they scratched at feet that had been too long in boots.

“Oh jesus…”

He’d known worse than this, much worse, but this morning he was too tender to weather it. The moment his nostrils registered the acrid smell his insides gave a sour plunge. It was all he could do to get his head over the side of the hammock before the retching began, although his hollow stomach produced nothing but vinegary air. When the fit finally passed, he lay shaking with his head still dangling down like overripe fruit. What the fuck kind of sickness was this? Had he eaten something bad?

The thought didn’t progress very far, stopped in its tracks by a painful spasm in his bladder. A trip to the heads felt completely out of the question, but what was the alternative? Groaning, he staggered to the bow, his head pounding like canon-fire with every step. Once there, he released a torrent of piss worthy of a racehorse, much to the amusement of Logan who stood chuckling behind him waiting his turn.

“Billy!” the man shouted a friendly greeting, loud enough to make Billy wince. “What the fuck happened to you last night?”

Leaning heavily against the ship’s frame as he tucked himself away, Billy managed to croak “buggered if I know,” before lurching off in the direction of the companionway. He needed air to clear his head, and he needed to get away from this godawful stench.

Up on the forecastle deck, he began to recover himself slightly. The dawn light was feeble yet, but the air was sharp and fresh. Draping his long body over the rail so that the spray could wash his face, he began to replay the events of the previous day, searching for clues as to the cause of his affliction. What had happened to him last night? His memory was sound up until dinner time but beyond that the details were weirdly out of reach. He’d retained only a confusing jumble of impressions; the Captain’s rings clanking against his desk, a song he didn’t realise he knew, a dark stain spreading on white paper. And running through it all, the unifying thread, was the taste of good wine. Cup after cup after cup…

So that was it. Shitfaced in the Captain’s cabin, and on his very first night on board! He cringed down to his soul as the evening began to come back to him, new images springing up relentlessly but all of them frustratingly incomplete. How had he ended up on the floor? Why in God’s name had he been singing? And, most mortifying of all, had he really sucked wine off his finger like that?

_Oh shit… What did you do Billy? What the fuck did you do?!_

“You alright there lad?” Billy made an anguished sound in his throat. He’d sunk down to the boards, face cradled in his hands, so he couldn’t see who was asking. But the man’s soft northern accent immediately identified him as Gates.

“That good eh?” Gates looked down at him hard, eyes narrowing a little, then stomped off to the galley. He returned moments later with a large flagon of water.

“Get this down your neck,” he said, “slowly mind, I don’t want to see it again.”

Billy took the flagon and did as he was told, sipping cautiously whilst Gates slumped down beside him and waited for him to finish. There was something on the quartermaster’s mind, clearly, but he seemed reticent to voice it and Billy was glad of the delay. He needed time to gather himself before he could dream of stringing a sentence together.

Awful as the sickness was, Billy knew that it would pass soon enough. What really destroyed him was the fear that he’d embarrassed himself in front of the Captain; and that maybe it was worse than just falling over or spilling wine. Something had changed last night, that much he knew. Because where yesterday he’d thought of Flint with gratitude and admiration, this morning those feelings had merged and transformed into a seductive kind of panic; a headrush so strong that he couldn’t imagine eating or sleeping for a week.

Eventually Gates said, “he’s a charismatic man when he wants to be, our Captain. Do you know what that means?”

Billy nodded, then shivered down to his toes as he suddenly recalled the sensation of strong arms reaching around his chest and coarse hands touching the backs of his own. Echoes of the embrace licked like flames across his skin, but he’d no idea why Flint had done it. The memory was completely isolated; an island in a sea of blank. _How did I make that happen? How can I make it happen again?!_ Perhaps it had never happened at all.

“Aye… well,” Gates shifted uncomfortably, “you’re not as daft as you look are you? Which is probably why _he_ felt like fraternising.” Pausing for a moment, he took in the young man’s lean form with a coolly analytical glance. His face creased into a frown, “part of why, anyway.”

Billy desperately wanted him to expand on that observation, but the man merely shook his head and cleared his throat noisily. “Look, son… Captain Flint is the most effective Captain this crew has ever had. I will _always_ require you to respect him. But he is also an extremely dangerous man. So don’t look to him for _anything_ besides orders. If you have a problem, or a question, or an observation, you come to _me_.” Gates had lowered his voice but the last few words came out raspy with emphasis, and he looked hard at Billy once he’d finished, waiting for some kind of acknowledgement.

The quartermaster’s warning couldn’t have been clearer but if the intention had been to steer Billy’s thoughts away from Flint, he’d achieved the exact opposite. In his heart, Billy felt a pulse of queasy excitement. He nodded his acquiescence, but only because he didn’t dare open his mouth in case a thousand revealing questions spilled out of it.

Gates didn’t look entirely satisfied, but before he could press Billy on it something caught his eye and made him scramble to his feet, dragging Billy up after him. Billy didn’t have to turn his head to know what had provoked the movement; the energy had changed all around them - backs straightening, conversations dying in the air – the way it always did when that solitary figure strode across the quarterdeck and took up his position, his green eyes sweeping restlessly over the horizon.

“Jesus lad, close your mouth before you catch a fly,” Gates’s tone was exasperated but not without affection. He took the flagon from where it hung limply in Billy’s hand and gave his shoulder a bracing squeeze. “You’re all right now, you’re on your feet, everything’s fine.”

It wasn’t remotely. But the nausea was gone at least, and the pounding in his head wasn’t quite as fierce, so Billy nodded again.

“Now go and see Randall and get yourself a job to do. At least try to look fucking useful.”

With a slap on the back, Gates propelled Billy toward the white-haired Bosun, who stood a few yards away giving instructions. But he couldn’t prevent the young man’s gaze from creeping upward as he went. Billy was terrified to meet the Captain’s eye, but panic drove him to seek it out nonetheless; just in case some scrap of evidence might be found there, something to suggest that the world had changed for Flint just like it had changed for Billy.

But when the Captain did suddenly turn his head, catching Billy full in the face and damn near stopping his young recruit’s heart, the man’s expression was one of complete indifference. Not even a flicker of recognition; Billy might just as well have been a bucket or a coil of rope. The coldness of it struck him like a blow and his whole body contracted in response, his shoulders hunching defensively, his arms crossing tightly across his chest.

And with the coldness came a sudden upsurge of doubt, undermining the few memories of last night that Billy had been confident of. All but convincing him that the Flint he’d been drinking with, the man whose warmth he remembered so vividly even though the details were hazy, must either be an illusion or a dream.

_Or maybe it’s me? Maybe I did something terrible or pathetic and now he can’t stand the sight of me?!_

But however hard he screwed his eyes shut or pushed his fingers into his scalp, the memories wouldn’t come. There was no way of knowing. His only option was to live with all the doubt and the confusion; to adjust to the weight of it.

“Now then Billy,” Randall’s broad grin was full of mischief, “I hear that you’re a bit fragile this morning?” Billy swallowed and managed a weak smile. “Then it’s time for some of Dr Randall’s physick! This ship needs to be clear for engaging so I am going to work you like a bastard. And when I’m done with you, Joji’s going to work you like a bastard. And then if you’re really lucky, we’ll round off the morning with a nice big battle! How does that sound?!”

It sounded surprisingly good to Billy. Better than festering in his berth. Better than thinking. And if he worked hard enough, if he distinguished himself somehow, perhaps the next time Captain Flint looked in his direction, he’d actually see him.


End file.
